RAVA Films
From West to East - Ep1: Turtle Island
National Gallery of Art - From West to East - Episode 1 featuring Marie Watt. Short Documentary, 15 min, 2023
American Academy in Rome
RAVA Films spent a few sun-filled days in September 2021 filming on the gorgeous hillside campus of the American Academy in Rome, one of the oldest and most prestigious academies of its kind. Luminaries such as Ralph Ellison, Philip Guston, and Mary McCarthy have taken part in the Academy’s program, and their creative spirit was palpable as we photographed this commissioned work for the Academy’s annual New York gala. With this institutional profile piece, we aimed to weave together the Academy’s 120 year history with contemporary images and voices, showing how a place dedicated to the study of ancient history and culture can be relevant to modern themes and concerns. Our video helped to galvanize interest in the Academy, raising significant funds for the organization and communicating its mission and message to trustees, patrons, and a broader audience as well.
Skowhegan 75 Years
Established in rural Maine in 1946, Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture is one of the oldest and most well-respected artist residencies in the world. Tracing the historical stories of Skowhegan, we followed artists of generations to capture the magic of the place for making art and more importantly becoming artists.
Art21: New York Close Up
Commissioned by Art21, this digital documentary film series is devoted to artists in the first decade of their professional career, living and working in New York City. These insightful pieces offer an intimate gaze into the upcoming wave of artists, their creative process, political and aesthetic philosophies, personal backgrounds and community perspectives. Starting this ongoing series in 2013, we have produced 17 films up to date.
Public Trust Documentary
A short piece featuring Paul Ramirez Jonas’ powerful project about the value of our words. Shot in Boston, participants were asked to add their pledges to the Public Trust marquee, creating a socially engaged artwork about the contracts we with make with each other and with ourselves, and the potent speech acts that keep a society together.
A Blade of Grass - FIELDWORKS
These short documentary series explore the beauty, rigor and impact of socially engaged art. Now in its XXX edition, these pieces entirely created and produced by RAVA in partnership with the A Blade of Grass Foundation present the inspiring work of artists that seek to make a meaningful change in the community. The profile of each of the six artists or collectives selected each year provides a glimpse into the transformative power of collaborative artworks and projects.
AIA Awards 2016
These short films honor the recipients of the most coveted awards of the American Institute of Architects for 2016. Through the insights of renown architects and experts, we illustrate the contributions of the winners to the profession and their impact in the architecture that is created throughout the country.
Crossing Brooklyn - Brooklyn Museum
Short web promo RAVA created for the Brooklyn Museum, promoting the exhibition currently on view titled “Crossing Brooklyn.” Drawing on the links between the artwork and the borough itself, the video hopes to break down the boundaries of the gallery and invite the viewer to experience Brooklyn’s neighborhoods, corners and creative voices in a new way.
SFUSD – VISION 2025
In December 2013, RAVA was contacted by Collective Invention & the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) to create and produce a series of films that helped promote the SFUSD efforts to re-imagine and re-design public education for San Francisco’s schools, for 2025. RAVA proposed creating a central video piece for Vision 2025’s online and social media marketing campaign that shed light on the issues with the public education system in San Francisco today, and delineated the SFUSD’s vision for addressing them. The pieces would include a multitude of voices from the student, parent and funding community, and from within the SFUSD, in order to show the multiplicity of perspectives and opinions involved in writing San Francisco’s vision for the future of public education.
Tangential to this central promotional piece, we also proposed creating a series of short 1-2 minute videos with repurposed material from our 9-day shoot about specific subjects relating to education: parental involvement, teaching, technology in schools, etc. The result was a series of 5 short 1-2 minute videos and 1 x 7 minute long video featuring approximately 20 subjects from the San Francisco public school system community: SFUSD’s Superintendent; Chief-of-Staff; public school parents; union leaders; teachers; and the biggest stakeholders in this initiative, the students.